much, and so much to find the thief; and no satisfaction, no revenge: nor no ill luck stirring, but what lights o'my shoulders; no sighs, but o' my breathing; no tears, but o' my shedding.

Tub. Yes, other men have ill luck too; Antonio, as I heard in Genoa,

Shy. What, what, what? ill luck, ill luck?

Tub. —hath an argosy cast away, coming from Tripolis.

Shy. I thank God, I thank God:-Is it true? is it true?

Tub. I spoke with some of the sailors that escaped the wreck.

Shy. I thank thee, good Tubal ;- Good news, good news: ha! ha!- Where? in Genoa?

Tub. Your daughter spent in Genoa, as I heard, one night, fourscore ducats.

I shall never

Shy. Thou stick'st a dagger in me: see my gold again: Fourscore ducats at a sitting! fourscore ducats!

Tub. There came divers of Antonio's creditors in my company to Venice, that swear he cannot choose but break.

Shy. I am very glad of it: I'll plague him; I'll torture him; I am glad of it.

Tub. One of them showed me a ring, that he had of your daughter for a monkey.

Shy. Out upon her! Thou torturest me, Tubal: it was my turquoise; I had it of Leah, when I was a bachelor: I would not have given it for a wilderness of monkeys.

r

Tub. But Antonio is certainly undone.

it was my turquoise; I had it of Leah, when I was a bachelor :] A turquoise is a precious stone found in the veins of the mountains on the confines of Persia to the east, subject to the Tartars. As Shylock had been married long enough to have a daughter grown up, it is plain he did not value this turquoise on account of the money for which he might hope to sell it, but merely in respect of the imaginary virtues formerly ascribed to the stone. It was said of the Turkey-stone, that it faded or brightened in its colour, as the health of the wearer increased or grew less. But Leah might have presented this stone to Shylock for a better reason, as it is said to "take away all enmity and to reconcile man and wife."-STEEVENS.

Shy. Nay, that's true, that's very true: Go, Tubal, fee me an officer, bespeak him a fortnight before: I will have the heart of him, if he forfeit; for were he out of Venice, I can make what merchandize I will: Go, go, Tubal, and meet me at our synagogue; go, good Tubal; at our synagogue, Tubal.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II.

Belmont. A Room in Portia's House.

Enter BASSANIO, PORTIA, GRATIANO, NERISSA, and
Attendants. The caskets are set out.

Por. I pray you, tarry; pause a day or two,
Before you hazard; for, in choosing wrong,
I lose your company; therefore, forbear a while:
There's something tells me, (but it is not love,)
I would not lose you; and you know yourself,
Hate counsels not in such a quality :

But lest you should not understand me well,
(And yet a maiden hath no tongue but thought,)
I would detain you here some month or two,
Before you venture for me. I could teach you,
How to choose right, but then I am forsworn;
So will I never be: so may you miss me;
But, if you do, you'll make me wish a sin,
That I had been forsworn. Beshrew your eyes,
They have o'er-look'd me, and divided me;
One half of me is yours, the other half yours,-
Mine own, I would say; but if mine, then yours,
And so all yours: O! these naughty times
Put bars between the owners and their rights;
And so, though yours, not yours.—Prove it so,
Let fortune go to hell for it,--not I.

.t

I speak too long; but 'tis to peize the time ;t

They have o'er-look'd me,] O'erlook appears to have been a term of witchcraft expressive of the fascinations of the evil eye.-See GLANVIL Sadducismus Triumphatus, p. 95.

t

to peize the time;] To peize, is to weigh, or balance; and figuratively, to keep in suspense, to delay.-HENLEY.

To eke it, and to draw it out in length,

To stay you from election.

Bass.

Let me choose;

For, as I am, I live upon the rack.

Por. Upon the rack, Bassanio? then confess What treason there is mingled with your love.

Bass. None, but that ugly treason of mistrust, Which makes me fear the enjoying of my love: There may as well be amity and life

'Tween snow and fire, as treason and my love.

Por. Ay, but, I fear, you speak upon the rack,
Where men enforced do speak any thing.

Bass. Promise me life, and I'll confess the truth.
Por. Well then, confess and live.

Bass.

Confess, and love,

Had been the very sum of my confession :
O happy torment, when my torturer

Doth teach me answers for deliverance!
But let me to my fortune and the caskets.

If

Por. Away then: I am lock'd in one of them; you do love me, you will find me out.

Nerissa, and the rest, stand all aloof.

Let musick sound, while he doth make his choice;
Then, if he lose, he makes a swan-like end,

Fading in musick: that the comparison

May stand more proper, my eye shall be the stream,
And wat❜ry death-bed for him: He may win;

And what is musick then? then musick is
Even as the flourish when true subjects bow
To a new-crown'd monarch: such it is,
As are those dulcet sounds in break of day,
That creep into the dreaming bridegroom's ear,
And summon him to marriage. Now he goes,
With no less presence," but with much more love,
Than young Alcides, when he did redeem
The virgin tribute paid by howling Troy
To the sea-monster:* I stand for sacrifice,
The rest aloof are the Dardanian wives,

u With no less presence,] With the same dignity of mien.-JOHNSON.
* To the sea-monster:] See OVID, Metamorph. lib. xi. ver. 199. et seq.

With bleared visages, come forth to view
The issue of the exploit. Go Hercules!
Live thou, I live:-With much more dismay
I view the fight, than thou that mak'st the fray.

Musick, whilst BASSANIO comments on the caskets
to himself.

Bass.-So may the outward shows be least them

selves,

The world is still deceiv'd with ornament.
In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt,
But, being season'd with a gracious voice,
Obscures the show of evil? In religion,
What damned error, but some sober brow
Will bless it, and approve it' with a text,
Hiding the grossness with fair ornament?
There is no vice so simple, but assumes
Some mark of virtue on his outward parts.
How many cowards, whose hearts are all as false
As stairs of sand, wear yet upon their chins
The beards of Hercules, and frowning Mars;
Who, inward search'd, have livers white as milk?
And these assume but valour's excrement,a

To render them redoubted. Look on beauty,"

y

a

b

- fancy-] i e. Love.
approve it-] i. e. Justify it.
valour's excrement,] i. e. The beards of Mars and Hercules.

Look on beauty,] i. e. Artificial beauty, and you shall find that it is purchased by the weight, such as paint, false hair, &c. and makes them lightest, i. e. most vain and wanton who wear most of these ornaments.

And you shall see 'tis purchas'd by the weight;
Which therein works a miracle in nature,
Making them lightest that wear most of it;
So are those crisped snaky golden locks,
Which make such wanton gambols with the wind,
Upon supposed fairness, often known

To be the dowry of a second head,

The scull that bred them, in the sepulchre.
Thus ornament is but the guiled shore

To a most dangerous sea; the beauteous scarf
Veiling an Indian; beauty's,d in a word,
The seeming truth which cunning times put on
To entrap the wisest. Therefore, thou gaudy gold,
Hard food for Midas, I will none of thee:

Nor none of thee, thou pale and common drudge
’Tween man and man: but thou, thou meagre lead,
Which rather threat'nest, than dost promise aught,
Thy paleness moves me more than eloquence,
And here choose I; Joy be the consequence !

Por. How all the other passions fleet to air,
As doubtful thoughts, and rash-embrac'd despair,
And shuddering fear and green-ey'd jealousy.
O love, be moderate, allay thy ecstacy,
In measure rain thy joy, scant this excess;
I feel too much thy blessing, make it less,
For fear I surfeit!

Bass.

What find I here?

[Opening the leaden casket.

Fair Portia's counterfeit? What demi-god

Hath come so near creation? Move these eyes?
Or, whether, riding on the balls of mine,
Seem they in motion? Here are sever'd lips,
Parted with sugar breath; so sweet a bar

Should sunder such sweet friends: Here in her hairs

the guiled shore-] i. e. The treacherous shore. Shakspeare in this instance, as in many others, confounds the participles. Guiled stands for guiling. Some of the modern editors read gilded.-STEEVENS.

d

an Indian; beauty's,. &c.] I have here deviated slightly from the folio the ordinary reading represents ornament as "the beauteous scarf veiling an Indian beauty," a sentence which by no means serves to illustrate the reflexion which Bassanio wishes to enforce. Sir Thomas Hanmer proposed to read dowdy for beauty!